Sunset Turcot Interchange: C'est vraiment Montréal!

It was a colourful sunset on the Turcot highway interchange, as seen from ville st Pierre. Starting with yellow, orange, magenta, and pale blue, I worked up dark browns and greys with variations on burnt yellow ochre (PR102) and indo blue (PB60). Accents of pylon-orange, green, pops of red, and dark sketch elements done in carbon black (PBk6) completed the scene. As I flicked the brush, little droplets accidentally hit the painting, reminiscent of Jackson Pollock, a late American painter who threw paint on the canvas quite intentionally. When painting something like this on location, you just have to be along for the ride, so to speak, and let your brush do all the work. Its a great spot to catch the sunset, albeit a little noisy and smelly, along with the massive construction project that is ongoing. I really liked painting a juxtaposition of bright pylon-orange against a pastel sunset. C'est vraiment Montréal!

Sunset Turcot Interchange, watercolour 8 x 10" cold press, May 2026

Sun down moon up, sky colours

Riding down to ville st Pierre with the sun going down and I found myself at one of the many elevated highway ramps, this one in the west direction. The elevated ramps often catch the sunset, and concrete happens to look pretty neat when its illuminated in orange or red-orange. I did a fantastic one last year of the sun setting on Turcot interchange in st Henri area. In this scene, I emphasized the convergening shapes of the ramp and the access road, and contrasted coral orange, purples, chartreuse, and the emerald green pops of car windshields and traffic signs. Cutting through the pastels are bright-red tail lights on passing cars, done with the excellent pyrol red paint (PR254). 

Sundown off ramp, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

Here is a scene of one of the many factores-turned-condos along st Ambrose street. I am standing on the Lachine canal bike path looking across. Composing the moon low in the scene was an artistic license thing, in fact, the moon was hanging high today. With near-complete darkness and no artificial lights with me tonight, it was tricky to get all the colours right. Deep purple clouds were rolling in on the horizon. 

Crescent moon condo living, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

In among the soaring new condo towers downtown, there is a new dépanneur on Peel called dépanneur Peel, pretty original name eh? Again, I composed the moon low so as to include it in the scene, near a bright LED street lamp. I painted the yellows and oranges first, then over-painted with darker colours made mostly of burnt yellow ochre (PR102) mixed with carbon black (PBk6) or dark blue (PB60). When painting at night you have to hang in there because its hard to see the effect until the colour blocks are filled in, and only the white and yellow light sources remain. One of my favorite night paintings of the year is Night Goose. It has a lot of views already. I did another good painting of the Sunset over Turcot from st Pierre, I will post it separately. 

Dépanneur Peel crescent moon,  watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

Thinking back on my paintings

With a holiday I did some spring cleaning and got into one of my boxes of paintings. It got me thinking back to my paintings from that era, in this example, its London Ontario early 2000's. I was sitting near the corner of Richmond and Dundas, back then I sat on a small camping chair to make paintings, looking to the east direction. It was an overwhelming scene but I gave it my best try, even getting the green light on the traffic lights, and a complicated sign with the word restaurant on it. Even today I would have trouble with such a scene! 

The other reason was to look at the back of my old paintings, as in, can I still paint on the backs of them? Basically every painting had an unused back, although they were mostly 5 x 7", so I went through and trimmer them down and got them ready for a second life. Before doing so, I pulled the good ones out, the memorable ones, and set those ones aside. So it looks like I'll be doing more 5 x 7" this summer. On my catalogue, grey font means I pulled it and painted on back, while strike-through font means I ripped the painting up and put in our composter. Fun fact, 100% rag watercolour paper composts quite well! 

Mallard sleeping, reamains of Otter Lake

On the way back today, I stopped by the remains of Otter lake, also once called little Pierre Lake. When they built the Lachine Canal in the 1820's, this lake was drained and eventually turned into a mega highway going through Montreal. At one of the lowest points, adjacent to the canal, there is a drainage ditch which the city preserved and landscaped as part of the Turcot interchange project. Its main role is to prevent the nearby truck depot from flooding, but this Mallard duck was having a good nap in the shade. If you rode past this, it would just be a storm ditch, but knowing its history adds more meaning. I kind of wish the lake were still here, or I had had a chance to see it, but no drawings or paintings seems to remain, just a few ancient maps from the 18th century. 

Mallard sleeping Otter lake, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

Nowhere Montreal, bridges, train, factory

Back in the pandemic year 2020 I rode my bike along an old industrial road that is normally hard to access due to heavy traffic and very noisy. Its an industrial area between east Lachine and ville st Pierre, although condo housing is popping up all around due to its location being near the Lachine canal. Due to it being in between a bunch of neighborhoods, I dubbed it 'Nowhere Montreal'. Perusing Google maps the other day, I was looking for a way to ride my bike onto the other side of the Lachine canal, the side you're not allowed to be on! From an access road off st Joseph blvd (in nowhere Montreal) on the east side of the train bridge underpass, there is a direct lane to a grassy ridge leading down to the canal embankments. There are no railing on this side so I stayed away from the edge. I've painted this bridge many times but always from the other side. You can see the bikes going a long across the canal, I could hear cyclists talking to each other. It was mostly quiet and sunny here, but I didn't stay long it wasn't exactly allowed to be here! 

Other side canal train bridge, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

The first painting I did, its the same bridge but further up on Norman street. A red-orange tanker car said Canada on it, but I changed it, and the graffiti to my initials. There was some really old graffiti on this bridge, by SAKE. He used to write everywhere in Montreal (including nowhere Montreal), but most of his stuff is gone now. I used a lot of bismuth vanadate yellow (PY184) which can go over top of other paint layers to create lime-green foliage. Its a bad habit I know, I like the way it turns the rinse water yellow. My rinse water was olive army-green after today!

 Train bridge and rail car, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

An old factory in Lachine's east side used to make giant steel beams for bridges, such as Cartier bridge and Mercier bridge. Massive overhead cranes are all along its front side, they were used to move the beams around and load them onto train cars. I wrote about it in more detail in a blog from last September. This scene is showing the rear of the old factory in perspective. There was an impressive array of different cladding, and bright blue tarps used to fill holes. It seems they are trying to preserve the structure and not let it crumble down. 

Old beam factory perspective rear, watercolour 8 x 10" cold press, May 2026

Here is a side view featuring the textured brick wall and aluminum siding with bright yellow door. Along the top runs a long tinted-glass sun roof, presumably to let natural light into the interior. 

Old beam factory side facade, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

This factory is still functional, its called Corbec inc up on Victoria street. Like the other factory, its exterior is a collage of different cladding including old red brick, red and blue aluminum, green-tinted windows, and a giant aluminum sided warehouse looming in the background. It seems to do metal work from what I can tell. In fact, the internet says it is a galvanizing plant. So, toxic runoff. 

Corbec Inc spring, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

 

Lachine in spring, pink tree, canal construction

I've been seeing these pink flowering Magnolia trees all around town, they only bloom for about a week and even that depends on weather. This one is in the backyard of a house that backs onto the old part of the Lachine canal, in Lachine proper. You can see part of the canal retainer wall in the foreground. 

Magnolia tree spring Lachine, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

Looking west along the old canal, there is a bike and pedestrian bridge in the foreground, and another footbridge in the background. On the right you see part of st Joseph blvd, and all around are green trees and green grass. I used a lot of bismuth vanadate yellow (PY184) to make all the chartreuse colours today. 

Old Canal Lachine bridge, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

A bike path winds its way along the piece of land between the old canal and the marina. There was a city-plan to 'blow up' this whole sector for five years in order to pave it over with marble interlocking bricks and fountains, but people complained and thankfully so. Its fine the way it is.

Ess shape bike path, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026 

An old industrial plot has sat empty for many years now, but today I saw that an enormous construction pit was dug deep into the earth. For about two or three stories down its a yellow-ochre earthy shale, then it turns to greyish bedrock. Trees would have put their roots down here, now it will end up being a parking garage. It was interesting to see what the land looked like underneath, you see a section of it towards the right of the pit. The back and left had tall retaining walls. 
Lachine pit, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026 

Viger square, maze and ferris wheel

Viger square is a large expanse of interlocking brick with concrete features and a few grassy hills. Looking west gave this creepy tree view, back-lit by a strong sun. Dandelions were blooming which created an ethereal glow. 

Creepy tree Viger square, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

Most of Viger square is surrounded by highways and bland condo developments, but this building still had its old-fashioned Victorian-style facade. Working from top to bottom I kept as much detail in the roof features as possible. A small drop of paint in the sky was turned into seagulls to hide the mistake. 

Old facade Viger square, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

They installed ridiculously long benches in Viger square, along with pillow-shaped concrete platforms. Wonder what the idea was other than pumping up the contract price? So it becomes a heat desert in the summer, useless the rest of the year. Better than condos I suppose, its a hard place to get a decent painting but I keep trying. 

Long bench Viger square, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026

Down at Old Port, its starting to fill up with tourists, so I did a painting here before the crowds get any bigger. On the left is part of an old warehouse turned into a maze, on the right is the Ferris wheel. Orange awnings adorned the front of a corner bistro. 

Maze ferris wheel, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, May 2026